


Fight or Flight

by Rose Argent (roseargent)



Category: Final Fantasy XIII
Genre: Amnesia, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-19
Updated: 2014-05-19
Packaged: 2018-01-25 19:16:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1659446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roseargent/pseuds/Rose%20Argent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Final Fantasy XIII - Fang/Vanille, minor AU: Fang's amnesia has caused her to forget the entirety of her romantic relationship with Vanille. Vanille remembers every moment they've spent together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fight or Flight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Thene](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thene/gifts).



> There's so much material about the world and characters of FFXIII that I doubtless missed something or got something wrong. If so, I apologise in advance and hope it's nothing major enough to detract from the story. 
> 
> It didn't turn out quite as I'd planned, as tends to happen, but I hope you like it!

It had been more instinct than decision, back at Euride, that led Fang to give Vanille the time to escape on her own. When she had time to think about it, after, Fang wondered exactly what had driven that instinct. She'd wanted Vanille to be safe, yes, but she'd also wanted something to fight, something more satisfying than the weak civilians of Cocoon; Fang had hoped that getting her heart pumping and her body moving in familiar patterns might shake something loose from her memories, something about her Focus or Vanille, something to explain the pained look she caught in Vanille's eyes when Vanille thought she wasn't looking. 

At first she hadn't realised that Vanille had forgotten only their Focus and how it turned out, and not their entire time as L'Cie, but once she figured it out there just didn't seem to be any good way to bring it up. Their Focus was the most important thing, anyway, or so Fang had assumed, but that look of Vanille's made her wonder if there was something else, something big, that Vanille remembered but she didn't, something that gave away her accidental lie. Vanille didn't challenge her on it, didn't press the issue, but that look... it ate at Fang. And she wondered, guilt twisting at the thought, if she'd stayed behind and had Vanille escape alone in order to get away from those eyes. If she'd stayed behind to protect Vanille by fighting because it was the only thing she did know how to fix.

But Vanille was her friend since childhood, the sister of her heart, and the only person in this bizarre place who understood Gran Pulse, who remembered wide open skies and great plains, wild and dangerous and beautiful, and Fang could never leave her for very long. She still didn't know what she'd forgotten that hurt Vanille so, but being apart was worse and now all she could see when she closed her eyes was Vanille, alone and crying. She had to find her.

*****

At first Vanille hadn't noticed anything was wrong with Fang, not really. They'd been so confused when they woke up, and then so overwhelmed by the strangeness of Cocoon, that there really hadn't been a lot of time or reason to wonder about little things seeming off. When Fang said she'd forgotten their Focus, Vanille had lied and said she didn't remember, either, because it was the only thing she could think of to do to protect Fang. The lie weighed on her, but if she told it enough times maybe she could make it be true, and forget the things that hurt to remember. 

But the first night, when they finally found somewhere they felt safe enough to sleep--or at least got so tired that they had to sleep whether they felt safe or not--Fang had laid down with her back to Vanille and not a word as to why. Vanille lay there awake, the warmth of her partner against her back, and wondered if Fang was angry with her. Had she started to remember something after all and blamed Vanille for doing nothing? Or had she guessed that Vanille's brand was still live because she'd failed and let Fang take the burden on alone? But the next day Fang was the same as ever, full of fire and and humour and wry smiles, even in this crazy situation, and Vanille dismissed her night-time thoughts as baseless. They'd been tired. 

The second night, it was the same. Vanille almost said something then, but it was the next day that they found a girl from Cocoon in the temple, branded with the mark of a Pulse L'Cie, and the time for talking about their relationship seemed pretty much over for a while after that. Vanille had thought to wait until Fang had calmed down a little, but then Euride happened and they were separated and Vanille was left alone with her worries.

Fang had protected her, like always. Fang had taken everything on her own shoulders, like always. But Vanille couldn't shake the conviction that it wasn't just like always--Fang was holding something back, too. 

*****

There were too many people in Cocoon; Bodhum alone was full of more people than Fang had ever seen in one place before and every time she looked up at the sky all she saw was more city. It made her dizzy and sick to look at that sky for long, but the view at ground level wasn't much better--a swarm of people, each one a potential enemy, and no sign of the one face Fang wanted to see. Had Vanille gone somewhere else, after Euride? But Anima was here, in Bodhum, and if they had any hope of remembering their Focus and getting home they needed to stick by the one place they knew was connected to Gran Pulse... didn't they? If Fang abandoned the idea that they'd both stick close to the temple and Anima then she had clues at all and no hope of finding Vanille in the sea of people filling Cocoon, so she put every other thought out of her mind and forged on ahead.

She spent a night alone, sleeping a few minutes at a time before being woken by dreams of things she didn't understand, and dreams she understood all too well. She dreamed Vanille's tear-stained face a thousand times that night, and worse. She'd left Vanille on her own, and the dangers in this place were different than they were on Gran Pulse--would Vanille recognise trouble in time?

Would Fang?

*****

Vanille didn't stay in the temple for very long, after returning there alone. Everywhere she turned it reminded her of Gran Pulse, and of how much time had passed. Everyone she'd known, except for Fang, was long gone, rotted away just like the offerings left in the temple. She left her weapon, wondering if she would ever come back for it or if it would rot away too, and went back out into the city.

Fang had hated this place pretty much from the start; she'd hated how the food was terrible and how the people were weak and stupid, she'd been shocked and disgusted by how no one seemed know what danger was. And all that was true. But a land of demons, that Cocoon definitely wasn't. Vanille heard the things they said about Gran Pulse, here, and she remembered the things they'd said about Cocoon, back on Gran Pulse. None of it seemed to be true. Maybe things had changed here in Cocoon since the war, maybe they'd been more aggressive then, but their exaggerated fear of Pulse didn't exactly make it seem like they'd won. She'd failed their Focus before because of fear, and now she found herself wondering if it had been the right choice after all. 

For days she wandered the seaside town--and if the sea was as bland as the food, well, it was still beautiful--half looking for Fang and half observing the people of Cocoon. She didn't know what she would say to Fang when they found each other again. She couldn't tell Fang the truth about Ragnarok. Would Fang be able to tell her truth about whatever _she_ was still hiding? She wanted to see Fang more than anything, but she was afraid, too. 

She still hadn't come to any answers when she once again met the girl who'd been branded L'Cie because of her. Her name was Serah and she was just like everyone else Vanille had met in Bodhum--bright and shining and kind and trusting. Too trusting for Gran Pulse, but this wasn't Gran Pulse. Peace made people weak, Vanille couldn't deny that. But was that so bad? 

*****

The Cavalry had caught Fang embarrassingly easily, but the deal they offered was a straw she was all too tempted to grasp at. Feeling like she had allies might ease the pressure that seemed to grow every day she was stuck in Cocoon, but Fang couldn't quite bring herself to trust anyone who wasn't from Gran Pulse. And besides, while she'd had no luck finding Vanille on her own, so far she wasn't having any better luck finding them with the Cavalry's help. Was that kind of help worth allying with the enemy?

None of her agonising ended up mattering, once Anima was discovered and the Purge announced. She couldn't have looked for Vanille on her own anymore, no matter what, and even if the Cavalry hadn't been very helpful so far she was pretty much stuck with them from that point on--she might not quite trust them, but she _definitely_ didn't trust PSICOM, and they were swarming all over Bodhum now. So she'd go along with the Cavalry for now, at least as far as the place they said the Purge would be taking place. 

The Hanging Edge. The name made Fang uncomfortable, the way seeing the scar in Cocoon's shell made her uncomfortable, and she found that every time someone said that name she reached to touch her scorched L'Cie brand. What was happening with Vanille's brand? How far had it progressed? Fang's need to find her was growing more desperate now. No longer just guilt and missing her and the kind of vague worry that Vanille always inspired in her, every time she thought about her own brand she was reminded of the ticking clock that was Vanille's. 

*****

Vanille knew she was choosing to leave Fang behind. Oh, she could say that she hoped Fang would find her way to the Purge train somehow, that they'd be reunited back on Gran Pulse, where they belonged, but ultimately Vanille was choosing to run away whether Fang came with her or not. Maybe she was even running from Fang, as much as from everything else; she couldn't make Fang watch her turn into a Cie'th and she couldn't bring herself to destroy Cocoon so, caught between two bad choices, all she could do was remove herself from Fang and Cocoon both. 

She'd never been cut out to be a L'Cie in the first place and maybe it was late to be running away, late and _stupid_ because she'd chosen it in the first place, chosen to become L'Cie early so that she could be with Fang. And what good had it done either of them? Fang had to bear everything by herself anyway because Vanille hesitated.

So she ran. Or she tried to run, at least. Only she ended up right back where she started, in Anima's temple, holding a weapon in her hand, except this time it wasn't Fang by her side but a kid she'd just met, one of the innocents of Cocoon that she'd doomed without meaning to. And even though Anima made even more L'Cie, hurt even more people, because she'd tried to run, she still couldn't think of any other answer but to keep running until she left her guilt behind.

*****

After days of relative quiet, searching for Vanille in a peaceful seaside town that made Fang's skin crawl even as it made her wistful, it was actually kind of amazing just how fast everything went to hell once the Purge was underway. Anima had really gone all out, making L'Cie after L'Cie to cover its own ass just like always, doing nothing directly because why would it when humans made such great fodder?

Let loose in the complacent, peaceful cities of Cocoon, six L'Cie could make an amazing amount of trouble. And as worried as she was about Vanille, about the holes in her memory, about time and brands and disaster, there was something about the chaos that just lit Fang right up. It was almost like being home again, something to fight everywhere she looked and as long as she was busy fighting the worries were a little quieter in her head.

And if she couldn't find Vanille now, with all the noise they were all making, well, then she would have to really wonder if Lady Luck had abandoned her at last.

*****

The hope of running away to Gran Pulse was gone but Vanille just couldn't stop running, once she'd started. That the person who'd chosen to run with her was one of the people she'd hurt most, just by existing here in Cocoon, well that might just be another punishment for running away. Maybe escaping both her destiny and her guilt was a little too much to ask for. 

They didn't get very far, her and Sazh. She lost herself in the lights and the sounds and the spectacle of Nautilus for a little while, her guilt never quite buried but quiet and still under the onslaught of beauty, but it didn't last. Couldn't, she supposed, as long as she was who she was. 

Her secrets spilled out, all but the first and most important lie she'd told, and for a moment she saw a glimpse of another way out. Not a pretty way, and Fang would mourn her, but better to die at the hand of someone she'd wronged than to become a Cie'th. She stopped running, and she stood her ground, prepared to face her punishment, but that out was taken away too. 

If she'd known her fate was just going to keep pulling her back every time she tried to run, if she'd known she couldn't get away or save anyone, she'd have stayed with Fang. At least they'd have been together for the time they had left, even if there'd be pain and lies and no good ending. She should have stayed. 

*****

It felt like she chased Vanille's shadow through all of Cocoon before finally catching her, and when they did meet again at last it was with the wind trying to sweep them off their feet and monsters all around. If they were standing grass instead of the metal deck of an airship it would have felt just like home. And in that moment when they brought down the wyvern together the clouded, pained look was gone from Vanille's eyes, wiped away by the thrill and the danger of flying monster-back. 

And if they were flying to their deaths fighting an impossible enemy, well, that was alright. They were moving in the same direction again, and that would have to be good enough for now.

*****

Every time Vanille grasped at a new hope, another blow came to dash it away. Something she wanted was given to her with one hand, while the other hand took away something else. She had Fang-her-sister back, but not Fang-her-lover. She was standing on the ground of Gran Pulse, the blue sky above her and the smell of growing things on the wind, but she'd been dancing to the Fal'Cie tune all along. But if that was to be the new balance of her life, for whatever there was of it left, she would take it. 

Or she thought so, anyway. Until Fang's bluff stripped away her last lie, and all the grief and guilt she'd been running from exploded out of her in the form of an Eidolon. And she could have given up, then. Could have let Hecatoncheir kill her and end it, like she'd been willing to let Sazh kill her and end it. But Fang was there, by her side, and it wasn't perfect but if Fang was still willing to stand by her with all her lies exposed, then that was worth fighting for. 

Fang was worth fighting for. And when they stood together after the fight was won, embracing but oh so chaste, Vanille felt her resolve to keep fighting settle deep into her heart. No more running, scared of the answers. She would have all Fang's truths out, just as Fang now had hers. She looked up, touched Fang's face and wondered if this would be the last time she would get this chance, and she kissed her.

*****

Stunned, her arms still around Vanille but locked stiffly now in something that felt a lot like panic, Fang had a thousand different thoughts try to go through her head at once. All the thoughts ran into each other and nothing ever got through so she stood there, mind blank and body frozen. Vanille started to pull away, after what felt like a long time but was probably only seconds, and that shocked Fang's body, at least, back into movement. She grabbed Vanille tight and refused to let go. 

"Fang?" Vanille's voice was soft, uncertain, and she wasn't quite meeting Fang's eyes, now. She sounded a bit hurt, a bit lost, but also... resigned, almost. Fang rested her forehead against Vanille's hair and breathed in its scent, trying to kick her brain back into gear as well. 

"Just. Give me a minute." Was this the first time they'd kissed? Or was that what Fang had forgotten? What was the right answer, here? She knew the wrong answer was letting Vanille go, but hugging her silently was only going to cut it for so long. Was this new? Or had they had a relationship before? Fang combed the memories she had left and came up with nothing that told her either way. She remembered Oerba and the orphanage and the temple, remembered becoming L'Cie despite her loathing of Fal'Cie, remembered Vanille volunteering to join her to save her from the wrath of the priests, and then... waking in the temple, her brand static and scorched. The same gap as before, and even though she knew some of what filled that blank space now, the rest was stubbornly empty. "I..."

A new question popped into Fang's mind, then, inspiration as sharp and sudden as a bolt of lightning. Did it _matter_ whether it was their first kiss or their thousandth? She _wanted_ this. 

*****

Vanille didn't know what to make of Fang's silence. It wasn't quite rejection, because Fang was holding her so tightly she would have to resort to violence to pull away. If she wanted to pull away. But Fang hadn't exactly kissed her back, and now she wasn't saying anything. 

And then it hit her. Fang hadn't been angry, hadn't been questioning their relationship because of Vanille's actions or her active brand or anything that had happened since they woke from the crystal sleep--Fang didn't _remember_ their relationship. They'd gone from friends to lovers only after becoming L'Cie, when they'd realised that one way or another they only had so much time left and couldn't afford to dance around their feelings anymore. Fang hadn't just lost the result of their Focus, she'd lost the whole time they spent travelling from Oerba towards Cocoon. 

Feeling relieved and kind of stupid, Vanille started to laugh. Then she started to cry. Then she was laughing and crying at the same time, and Fang was starting to make half-panicked attempts at soothing noises. "I thought you were _mad_ at me!"

*****

It took Fang's overworked mind a moment to catch up with what Vanille meant, and then Fang felt almost like cry-laughing, too. Vanille hadn't sussed out that her memory loss was worse than she'd let on--she'd been sad because she'd thought Fang was rejecting her on purpose. "I'm sorry. By the time I realised you hadn't forgotten as much as I had, it never seemed like a good time to talk about it." 

"Me, too. I kept thinking, we'll talk later, because I was afraid of what the answer would be." Neither of them had the luxury of 'later', now, and Fang was glad that at least the ticking clock had got them moving in the right direction at last. 

"Are you okay with starting all over? I keep trying to remember, but..." Fang loosened her hold on Vanille a little, stepping back just enough to look Vanille in the eyes. 

Vanille shook her head, but it was with a tearful smile. "I don't care if it means starting all over, I don't want to waste any more time without you."

Fang was the one to kiss Vanille, this time, and she thought maybe it was a little clumsy at first but she got the hang of it right quick. Like her frozen brand, her body knew what had happened in those missing days, even if her mind didn't. And as Vanille kissed her back in a way that made her body remember some very interesting things indeed, Fang thought that Lady Luck had to be with them after all, for them to mess it all up so badly and have it still work out in the end.

Just vaguely at the edge of her awareness Fang heard someone make a little choking noise, and then Lightning hushed them up and the only thing Fang could hear was the sounds of Gran Pulse all around them, a comforting and familiar background to the soft little sounds Vanille was making. Those little sounds were _very_ interesting to Fang, and she wondered if the others would give them enough time for her to figure out how to wring more sounds out of Vanille.

And then Vanille pulled her down to the ground and Fang decided that the others really weren't going to have a lot of say in the matter, just now.


End file.
